Submit a Biography

Biography Example

Barbara A. Seals Nevergold, PhD

A native of Louisiana, Dr. Seals Nevergold, moved to the Eastside of Buffalo, New York, in 1947 with her parents, the late Clara Ellis Seals and Rev. Willie B. Seals, seven brothers, and a sister. She is a graduate of the Buffalo Public Schools and Buffalo State College, where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree in French Education. She is also an alumnus of the University at Buffalo with two Master's of Education degrees in French Education and Counseling Education. In 1986, she earned a Doctor of Philosophy degree at UB in Counseling Education. Dr. Seals Nevergold also studied French at Laval University in Quebec, Canada, and at the University of Dijon in Dijon, France.

Dr. Seals Nevergold began her career as a French teacher in the Buffalo School System. She also worked as a guidance counselor in the system. Subsequent positions have included: Executive Director of Niagara Frontier Association for Sickle Cell Disease, Inc.; Vice President for Children's Services at Friendship House of Western New York, Inc.; CEO of Planned Parenthood of Buffalo and Erie County, Inc.; and Regional Director for Berkshire Farm Center. Dr. Seals Nevergold retired as the Director of Student Support Services at the University of Buffalo's Educational Opportunity Center. She has also held adjunct instructional positions at Empire State College and the University at Buffalo. Beginning in the Fall of 2006, Dr. Nevergold and fellow co-founder, Dr. Peggy Brooks-Bertram, of the Uncrowned Queens Institute, began working full-time on establishing the Uncrowned Queens Center for Excellence at the University at Buffalo.

From 2006 to 2010, the Uncrowned Queens Center for Excellence at the University at Buffalo supported the Institute by providing a home and helping extend the many programs developed and carried out by the Institute. The Uncrowned Queens Institute, founded in 1999 by Drs. Seals Nevergold and Brooks-Bertram, promotes the collection, preservation, and sharing of individual histories of women, women's organizations, and women's collective history; and aims to teach and educate women about using technology to preserve and share their histories.

Dr. Seals Nevergold is an educator, administrator, community and political activist. She has been a vocal advocate for parental involvement in the public schools. In 1989, she also co-founded, with Dr. Brooks-Bertram, Concerned Parents and Citizens for Quality Education, Inc. CPCQE was credited with increasing public awareness of educational issues and organizing parents as effective advocates. In addition, she served on several committees and task forces established by the Buffalo Board of Education. An unsuccessful run for the school board in 1993 nonetheless demonstrated the importance of parental involvement in local school politics.

Dr. Nevergold was appointed an at-large member of the Buffalo Board of Education in 2012. She served as the President of the Board from July 2013 to July 2014. In May 2014, she was elected to a five-year term. She is an active participant in many of the District's task groups and committees. Dr. Nevergold also served as the 2015-17 Treasurer of the NYS Conference of Big 5 School Districts, having served as that group's President for a one-year term. She was a member of the Resolutions Committee of the New York State School Boards Association.

Autobiography Example

Barbara A. Seals Nevergold, PhD

This picture reminds me of when we first moved to Buffalo from Alexandria, Louisiana.

Photo by Rev. W.B. Seals

I am the second daughter and fifth child of Rev. W.B. Seals and Mrs. Clara Ellis Seals. I am also their last child, born in Alexandria, Louisiana. I was born on April 19, 1944. When I was three years old, my parents, three brothers (Willie, John, and James), and sister (Mildred) all moved to Buffalo, New York. We were part of the historic Second Great Migration. My parents wanted to escape Jim Crow and build a better life for us in the North. We joined my father's sister, Alice Jones, who had moved to Buffalo's downtown district a few years earlier. Like many who moved from the south during that time, we first lived with “Nanny” Alice and her family on Walnut Street near Broadway. Ten of us lived in a four-room apartment with no hot water.

This photo, probably taken during my first winter in Buffalo, reminds me of that apartment. That tree is just outside the apartment building. Our apartment was one of four, two on the ground floor and two on the second. We shared a lavatory, just a commode and sink, with the other ground-floor apartment. I remember that during the winter, we had only a coal-burning potbelly stove to heat our apartment. We took baths in a round aluminum tub filled with hot water from a pot on the stove. In the winter, the oven was lit, and the door opened to provide heat for the kitchen.

My aunt, her husband, and daughter moved to another apartment down the street about two years later. We lived in that Walnut Street apartment for ten years before moving to the Fruit Belt.

My father, Rev. Seals, a minister at St. John's Baptist Church, worked at the Chevy Plant. And my mother was a housewife who stayed home with the children. When I started school, I attended School 12 on Spruce Street. Over the years after our move to Buffalo, our family added four more children, all boys. Growing up as a middle child in a family with seven brothers and an older sister was quite a learning experience. My oldest brother is 12 years older, and the younger one is 18 years younger! There was never a dull moment in the Seals' household.